


Aftermath; Intervals

by KalicoFox



Series: The Aftermath [2]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Gen, Introspection, Questioning Religion, References to Mind Control, References to Torture, Social Justice, Talking, Time - Freeform, Weapons Training
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-27
Updated: 2016-06-16
Packaged: 2018-05-09 19:56:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,647
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5553296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KalicoFox/pseuds/KalicoFox
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bits of story that won't fit in with the main Homestuck; Aftermath story. All story fragments are canon within the Aftermath universe.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Sickles fly through the air as you attack the Signless again, steel singing through the air. He isn’t sure what you're doing, asking him to train you with his weapons, but you’ve been insistent, and he can't find a real reason to object, (it’s not like there’s anything else to do, really,) so here you are.

It's almost like a dance, your sickles sliding off of his as he ducks out of the way, then around you, his own curved weapons whipping through the space where your head had been just a fraction of a second before.

You can't keep up this pace for long, dead or not, you still get tired.

You fling yourself into a forward roll, twisting so you come up facing him again, and this time you don't hesitate, throwing yourself back at him with the sickles held, crossed, in front of you.

He dodges with casual, almost contemptuous ease, and you hiss as he scores a cut across your unguarded side.

His face is expressionless, his white eyes flat, and your own eyes narrow. You want more than anything else to wipe that expression off his face, but every time you let your temper get the best of you, he dumps you on your ass, so you back off a couple of steps instead, circling him carefully as you search for an opening.

He doesn't move.

He never moves when you try to circle him. You'd given up on thinking that if you can get him from behind he's any more vulnerable than if you attacked him head on, but that doesn't stop you from trying now.

You _move_ , leading with your left sickle, the right sickle trailing in your hand behind you, ready to follow through when he blocks the left.

He twists, tangling your sickle in the curve of his own, and your right blade comes rushing up your side, but lower, aiming at his legs, trying to hamstring him so he can't stand.

White eyes widen and you feel a rush of satisfaction as he disengages, leaping away.

He wasn't expecting that.

You caught him by surprise.

_Yes._

You press the attack now, a little more reckless, but you don't care. _You caught him off guard._

His face is back to the blank mask though, and you're sure you're not going to catch him off guard again. Not with the same trick, and least.

He lets you come at him, patient as always, and your arms are by your sides as you run this time, your finger clenching convulsively on the leather grips of your weapons.

One sickle comes up; you're trying to hook him in the side, and it gets knocked away, _hard_ , with the outside of his blade. That's fine, you expected that. You don't let the blow redirect you off course, and instead you spin with the force of the blow, the other sickle coming down in a sweeping slash, the full force of the turn behind it.

There's a flash of agony, and your outstretched arm goes flying.

A sickle is nestled at your throat, and the Signless raises his other weapon into view.

You cringe at the blood dripping from it, biting your lip to keep from howling at the pain of your newly missing limb.

"Damn." You hiss, and now, _now_ his lips twitch.

He steps back, the sickles he held disappearing into the void as you concentrate.

Everything in the dream bubbles is a matter of will, so to fix a missing limb all you have to do is will it to no longer be missing. Unfortunately, pain is still a thing, since you _know_ that getting hurt, well, hurts, and there's not really anything you can do to convince your mind otherwise.

Your severed arm vanishes, and you shift, testing the range of motion.

It's fine, as always.

It's just habit to check, by now.

"You're getting better." Signless says, "Faster."

His voice is deeper than yours, or Karkat's, but without Karkat's rasp, or your own tendency to ramble.

You sigh. "Thank you."

You flap your sweatshirt, trying to get some cooler air against your skin, but it doesn't help, and with a sigh, you visualize yourself in clothes similar to his; a loose, sleeveless turtleneck, red to his black, and high waisted, loose fitting pants.

"Why are you doing this?" he asks, and you sigh again.

"Because I never could have done it on Beforus." You say simply.

The Signless raises an eyebrow at you, and you sigh a third time, running your hands through your hair, then grimacing when they came back damp with sweat.

"I fully realize that those of us on Beforus had a much easier time of it than those of you who were raised on Alternia." You say firmly, and hesitate.

He nods slightly, gesturing you to get on with it.

"But Beforus isn't- wasn't- perfect. It... They... Augh." You scrub at your face, frustrated.

It's so _easy_ to talk about this sort of thing, to anyone except him. He's you, in a way. He has your memories, but from everything you've managed to find out about him since you died, he either doesn't have all of them, or he's seriously misinterpreting them.

And you're not sure you want to find out which option is the truth.

"All right, fine. Fair warning, I might get carried away."

His lips tilt up, crookedly, but the expression is still recognizably a smile.

"No trigger warnings?"

You pause. "Will hearing about how the utopian society you preached about for most of your life wasn't actually a utopia trigger you?"

He shakes his head, and the smile is more visible now.

"How about hearing how the caste system was very much alive and well, and used as an excuse to keep trolls from the lower bloodcastes, especially those with mutations, as little more than pets?" You press, feeling the familiar heat of anger rising in your chest.

The smile is fading now, but the Signless shakes his head again.

"Then you will be fine." You say, and start talking.


	2. Introspection: Dave

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A look at Dave.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> May be canon for Aftermath, but will probably have no real bearing on the story itself. Just a little something to work through some writer's block on the main story.

It starts as an interest.

You wanted to know how clocks work, so you took apart your alarm clock.

When Bro walked in on you, sitting in a tangle of wires, with the plastic case set to one side, you'd been afraid that he would be angry.

He wasn't.

Instead, he brought out a different alarm clock. One of those big, old fashioned things, with the metal bells on top that would ring like crazy when the alarm was set to go off.

He took off the back, wound it up, and let you watch it tick; the gears all fitting together perfectly, each turning a little bit as the spring uncoiled.

You held the key still, keeping the spring from unwinding, and imagined that you could feel time slowing down as the ticking slowed.

 

You got older, and learned how clocks worked. Learned about the vibrational frequency of quartz, and how it was the standard by which time is set. You learned about the past, and how to tell how old things are by how they look, or what's around them, or by the decay rate of their atoms.

It all seemed so consistent.

You learned how to preserve dead things; how the preservation slowed down their decay rate so that they didn't seem as old as they were.

But you knew that they were older than they looked, and it bothered you a little bit.

It seemed... off. Like there was an easier way to keep dead things fresh.

 

You got even older, and learned about irony; about hiding your true self so that it couldn't be hurt, and about concealing things without lying so that you had no soft bits exposed. It was a bit like fossilization, in a way. Creating an imprint of just one part of you that others could look at and make judgments about, without ever being able to see the rest.

You were fine with that.

 

You meet a boy, online, who dreamed of flying, and who had learned all he could about the weather. He loved movies, and dreaming, and you wondered how he'd lived for so long with all of his soft bits exposed, open for anyone to poke at them.

You might have envied him, just a little, but you became friends anyway, and soon the two of you met two others; girls this time. One who wanted to be able to understand her own mind, and turned to picking apart the minds of others as she searched for similarities, and one who seemed to hide nothing, as open and guilless as the sky. (But the sky hides the stars behind it, and wasn't it funny how you got glimpses of something so much bigger, so much deeper, behind her cheerfulness sometimes?)

 

The four of you grew close, and you wanted to draw back your shell a little. Wanted to let them see some of the bits of you that matched the bits of them they had left on display, but you couldn't. You hadn't made yourself a shell. You had made yourself a cage. A box of granite, marked with irony and sarcasm and extended metaphors that meant almost nothing to you.

You couldn't show them, but you could tell them. Little bits and pieces. Things about you that only Bro knew, wrapped in irony and metaphors so that if they weren't looking, they wouldn't see.

But little by little, the saw, and they understood, and you grew closer.

But your shell was still there, and you still couldn't break out, and you honestly (because even if you can't be honest with anyone else, you must always be honest with _yourself._ ) weren't sure you wanted to. It was comfortable. It was safe.

There was always a chance that if you cracked open, they wouldn't like what they saw. And there you would be, with your soft bits on display, ready to be cut and stabbed and ripped apart.

So you didn't.

 

And then there were meteors, and panic, and strife, and _Bro bought you some time_. And somehow that seems so... ironic. But you aren't sure why, and your egg hatched, and you were gone. Away from where you'd grown up, even if the building itself had followed you.

The heat was different, more scorching, less humid, but it sank into your skin, and curled around your bones, and it just felt _right_. Like the endless grinding of gears and the faint ticking that came from everywhere and nowhere. It felt more like home than anywhere you'd ever been before, and you didn't even notice when the ticking stopped being a sound and started being a beat.

But you know beats. You know rhythm. You know it to your core, and it's a simple matter to shuffle it around, until you're staring yourself in the back of the head, and all you can feel is the faint, throbbing pulse of time in your blood.

 

It ends with your friends.

Because somewhere over the three years you'd been playing, you'd cracked, and shown more of yourself than you ever meant to, and instead of tearing at the exposed bits, Rose had simply accepted them, and shown you hers in turn.

And after that, it'd been easy, and hard, and painful, but you'd grown up a little, and it'd been hard, but you think you like who you are now much more than you like who you used to be. And that's time. It wears down the rough edges of things, and smoothes and polishes until what you end up with sometimes doesn't look remotely like what you started with.

And that's fine.

It ends with John, and you, and Rose, and Jade, and the kid versions of your parents ( _Bro._ ) and the five trolls who somehow made it this far.

It ends with a door, floating in space.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Should anyone wish to talk to me about anything in the Aftermath-verse, or about Homestuck in general, my tumblr is where I tend to post most about Homestuck. kalicofox.tumblr.com .  
> I look forward to hearing from you.


	3. Mituna; Dream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mituna dreams the life of The Psiionic.   
> Takes place sometime during/after chapter 6 of the main story, but before chapter 7.

==> Mituna: Dream.

_You are floating in a sea of stars. Your body is vast, and you are powerful; neither the cold of space, nor the heat of stars can touch you. You can go anywhere,_ do _anything._

_Save die._

She _keeps you alive, crooning endearments and promises and threats to you. They mean nothing to you now. Not after so long._

_You can remember a time when every word that fell from her lips was something you treasured. You remember a time before that when every word she spoke was like acid in your ears._

_Now, you simply do not care. You have the stars, you have the millions and millions of connections that make up the Alternian communications network, and you have yourself. And that is what you will have to content yourself with._

_You know that you were not always like this. Your memory banks are perfect. But even now, after the last of your (friendsgrouppeoplekin) are most likely dead, you cannot bring yourself to remember. Just as you cannot bring yourself to do anything more than spare brief moments for status updates on the organic shell that used to be yours._

_The pain had driven you out of it; the mind-eating knowledge that time was passing, and you should be aging, but you weren't and everyone that mattered was dead, or would be dead soon._

_You had retreated into the systems you had been connected to; allowed cold data and mindless streams of numbers and the lack of hormones or bodily anything to numb you to everything._

_You did not regret it._

_You would not regret it._

_You have not returned to your original body in centuries._

You wake up screaming.

There are hands tugging your claws away from your head, pinning you down, keeping you from frantically checking your body for the ports you _know_ are there.

There's something wet on your face, and _you can't see you're blind you're helpless and you're going to be integrated into the ship someone help you don't want to die like this it will be too much you can't you can't you CAN'T SOMONE PLEASE!_

You fight as hard as you can against the restraints. You can't tell if they're hands or shackles anymore, but it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter in the least. You're being held down, you can't escape. You're going to be installed in a ship, and you will go insane.

You fall limp, exhausted from trying to get free, and there's a few seconds reprieve before the restraints fall away.

There's someone talking, but it's background noise compared to the fact that _you are loose, you have to ESCAPE_.

You move faster than you'd thought possible, psionics crackling around your horns and your hands as you flee the darkened room.

You whip through empty halls, passing rooms and rooms and _rooms_.

You have to find somewhere safe. Somewhere to hide. This doesn't look like the interior of any ship you'd ever seen, but you can't be sure you aren't trapped in space. You need more information. You need _time._

You don't stop running until you find yourself in a room far, far from where you'd started.

You don't dare to relax even a bit until the door is completely blocked with everything in the room. It won't keep out a subjuggulator, but it will at least slow them down for a second or two.

That done, you set about preparing yourself to sell your life dearly.

One minute passes.

Two.

No one comes for you.

Nothing happens, and slowly, so. painfully. slowly, you feel the panic drain out of you until you're huddling in a corner, your eyes still fixed on the door.

"'Tuna?" The voice outside the door makes you jump, psionics crackling at your horns and fingertips.

The name makes you pause.

That's your name. Not your title. Your _name._ Who...?

"Mituna? Are you there?"

The door rattles, but the pile of stuff in front of it keeps it from opening.

"Mituna, what's wrong? Do you have a migraine?"

The voice is familiar and not. You know it. It's an important voice. It means so much to you. If you could just _remember..._

"Tulip." The word? Name? falls from your mouth completely unbidden, and the door stops rattling.

The person behind the door sighs (with relief?) and there's the sound of fabric sliding down the wall.

"Hey 'Tuna. You doin' all right in there?"

You scrub at your face. You're getting a mindstorm and the pain is making it hard to concentrate.

"I'm cool."

And you are. It's getting easier to remember. You are Mituna Captor, you are fucking rad as hell.

You are also Mituna Captor. The Psiioniic. The Helmsman.

Shit. No. No. You aren't him.

You're only nine. You haven't lived thousands of sweeps hooked into a starship. Your Empress is Her Imperial _ous Condes_ nevolence.

**No.** Her. Imperial. Benevolence.

You grew up on Befo _nia_.

**Beforus**. You grew up on Beforus.

Latula Pyrope is your Matesprit.

There is no confusion in that thought, and you sigh with relief.

"I'm cool." you repeat, and you hope that it isn't the lie you're afraid it is.


	4. Kankri; Dream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kankri dreams the Signless' life, and learns that you can't learn everything about someone unless you've actually been them.

==> Kankri: Dream

You have an idea of what will be waiting for you when you fall asleep. You've watched your fellow Beforan trolls succumb; one by one waking up shaking, or screaming, or in tears. Mituna can't even be in the same room as Meenah without either trying to kill her or breaking down in terrified tears.

For all that he seems to have recovered from burning out his psionics; he seems even more broken now.

Kurloz is the only troll who doesn't seem to be affected by receiving the memories of his Alternian self, and even seems pleased by the way Cronus will leave any room he enters. The only real change from Kurloz had been his removing of the stitches holding his mouth shut. Apparently, at some point his tongue had grown back, and he was taking advantage of that to have quiet conversations with his dancestor, Gamzee.

Still, you think that it's entirely likely that you won't even receive the memories. After all, you did meet and speak with your alternate self in the dream bubbles. You don't need the memories. You heard it all straight from the hoofbeast's mouth.

So there's no reason to continue stalling. You're going to finish your morning ablutions, crawl into your pile, (and gog do you miss sopor,) and sleep without any dreams at all.

And even if you do, you're sure they won't change how you act.

 

You're three the first time you see a highblood beating a lowblood in the street. No one intervenes, and your mother sweeps you up into her arms and hurries away when it looks like you're about to interfere.

It was the first time she'd taken you into a town with her, rather than leaving you tucked somewhere safe while she traded what little the two of you had for necessities.

You're sobbing by the time you get back to your camp site for the day, and she brushes your tears away carefully as she asks what's wrong.

You try as hard as you can, to explain to her how you know that was wrong. How you'd dreamed and dreamed and Seen that that was not the way things were supposed to work between trolls.

She'd smiled at you, and patted you between your tiny horns, and said that unfortunately most other trolls didn't see it that way.

She couldn't tell you why, when you asked.

Sweeps passed, and every instance of casual cruelty; of trolls using and abusing other trolls just because they could made you more and more sick inside.

You knew they could be better. You'd Seen it. You had to do something. The system had to change. It couldn't keep on like it was, or Alternia would tear itself apart.

You didn't have wealth, or status. Any attempt to change the system from the inside would get you culled faster than you could blink.

All you could do is talk; try to convince people that they had worth because they were alive. That being born with blood of a certain color meant nothing about their capabilities or responsibilities.

So you talked to everyone, and lived your words, and hoped that that would be enough.

You spoke to anyone who would listen, highblood or lowblood alike. Slave or free, it didn't matter. All that mattered to you was that trolls start to think about the things they did, and said, and saw every day.

Your message spread, and tales of your visions, and you soon had a price on your head. Not a very high bounty, but the longer you and the Dolorosa evaded capture, the higher it climbed.

Sometimes other trolls would travel with you, but it wasn't until Meulin, and, eventually, Mituna, that anyone stayed. They were the only two willing to risk the life you and your mother led.

And they paid dearly for it.

You remember every excruciating minute of your execution. The way the manacles bit into you, melting the skin at your wrists. The hissing, sizzling, scorching sound. The smell of burning meat, and the way your mutant, candy red blood trickled from the many cuts littering your body.

The worst pain, though, was the look on Meulin's face. The way tears poured down your mother's face. The guttural, snarling sobs from Mituna.

The pain broke a dam inside you that you hadn't even known existed, and words flowed, washing over the trolls gathered to see the subversive element get what was coming to him.

You hated them all, and you loved them. You pitied them all so much that it hurt even more than the shackles holding you in place, and it wasn't until the arrow sank into your side that you realized you had been straining against them, trying to reach out.

You pitied them, and they killed you. You hated them, and you forgave them. You loved them, and you would have done anything to keep them from making this mistake. Not for your sake, but for theirs.

You were twelve sweeps old, and all you could do was die and hope that eventually they would understand.

You wake up, and you know without checking that tears are streaming down your face.

You aren't sure if they ever really stopped.

But... you're alive? How are you alive? You felt yours- Oh no. Nonono.

Where's Meulin? Where's Mituna? Where is your mother?

You fling yourself out of the pile you were laying in, (and why were you sleeping on a pile of comfort blocks and books?) and out the door of the unfamiliar familiar room you found yourself in.

You want to shout for your (matespritbestfriendkinfamily), but you don't know where you are, and nothing looks like it should, so you're left racing through the unfamiliar corridors, trying to find any sign of them. (theywouldnotcouldnotleaveyoualonecan'tbealoneneveralone.)

Instinct, or intuition, or something in between that comes from the same place you get your visions, nudges you, and you follow; down a spiral staircase, through several doors, and into a room that smells like Meulin and Mituna and Mother.

They're all there. Right in front of you, sleeping close enough to touch on a pile made of bolts of fabric and books and electronics.

For a moment, all you want to do is fling yourself onto them; burrow yourself into their warmth and their sheer presence, but the place your visions come from nudges you again, and instead you simply sink onto the pile, right in between Meulin and your mother, one hand outstretched to tangle in the sleeve of the overlarge shirt Mituna was wearing.

Explanations for how you're alive, or why they look so young can wait until they wake up. Right now, all you want to do is bask in their presence.

Your yawn surprises you, and you let out a breathy chuckle. You're still tired. Perhaps you'll get a little more sleep, too. They won't leave you.

 

When you next wake up, your head is a tangled, jumbled mess of memories; of events that you've never lived. Part of you wants to bury them; lock them away and never think about them again, but another part of you, a larger part, knows the futility of that. You are Blood, and Blood remembers.

Luckily, when you open your eyes and look around, you're alone. Porrim, Meulin, and Mituna must have left at some point before you woke, and part of you is incredibly, pathetically grateful for that. You _need_ to get your head sorted out, and you need to do it quickly, before everything becomes too much for you to handle. The other part of you, the part that holds your alternate memories, is disappointed. He'd been so sure that they wouldn't leave. That they'd stay with him, and guard him while he slept.

But they aren't _his_ , you remind yourself viciously, striding over to the door and yanking it open, and you're just the _Insufferable._ Not the Signless.

You make it two steps out of the room before stopping dead in your tracks.

Mituna is there, sitting on the floor with his back to the wall, twiddling his helmet in his hands.

"Hey Kankri." he says, more quietly than you've heard him speak in sweeps, "Thleep well?"

"Yes." you reply shortly, and Mituna nods.

"We thought you'd be... leth upthet if you didn't have uth all over you when you woke  up. Dolo-" he pauses for a split second, winces, and tries again, " _Porrim_ and Meulin went to find thomething to eat. You want anything?"

You're gaping at him. This... this is unreal. A dream. It has to be. Mituna _hates_ you. Platonically, even. And yet, here he is, actually being something that looks very much like _nice._ To _you._

"I want," you say stiffly, "to go back to my respite block, and not come out or be bothered until I can make sense of _everything._ "

Mituna cracks a crooked half smile, "That'th a lot to make thenthe of." he replies, his tone gently mocking, and that throws you off even further.

"I think I can handle it." you snap, and, turning on your heel, you stalk down the hall, eager to get as far away from this ( _newfamiliardifferentcomfortable **wrongright**_ ) friendlier version of Mituna as possible.

You're shaking by the time you get back to your respite block, your shoulders knotted tight and your head pounding from the tension, and you are so incredibly _angry._

This wasn't supposed to happen. You weren't supposed to _need_ the memories. You'd spoken to him! That was supposed to be it!

But thinking about the conversations you'd had with Signless sends a flash of white-hot shame through you, and you sink down onto your pile, cuddling one of the comfort squares.

You hadn't had any _idea_ what Alternia was like, and hearing about it, with no real frame of reference, hadn't really gotten the situation across. Now though, now you _knew_ , intimately, the kinds of things your alternate self had seen and done. And now you could look at yourself, and your 'activism' and see it for what it really was.

You curled tighter around the comfort square, hiding your face in the rough fabric.

  _"Hey."_ the voice is so quiet that you can't be sure you heard it in the first place.

_"Hey wiggler."_

You sniffle, burying your face deeper into the comfort square. You are _not_ going to start hallucinating now. Absolutely not.

_"Kankri Vantas, I swear to the mother grub's tiny, vestigial wings, if you don't pay attention I'm going to-"_ the voice cuts off as you look up, ready to give whomever has invaded the sanctity of your respite block a lecture they'll never forget.

Instead, you're left gaping at the pale, barely there ghost of... you.

Well, not really you. He's older, and way, _way_ taller, with the dark skin that marks an adult. But his horns are the same shape as yours, and his eyes fairly _glow_ with the bright crimson that runs in your veins.

" _Signless_!?" You demand, scrubbing your face roughly to eliminate any trace of the tears you _had not_ been crying a few moments ago.

_"Hi."_ He waves awkwardly, _"Sorry about, you know..."_ he gestures awkwardly with one hand, and you just barely catch a glimpse of ruined flesh around his wrist before he tucks the hand back into the daycloak he's wearing.

"It's fine." You say automatically, then instantly take it back, "No, it's not. This is not fine in the slightest. Do you _realize_ how triggering this is? Do you have _any idea at all_ how not all right this is? _Why are you here!?_ "

The last question is hissed between your bared teeth, and the fond smile that softens the crimson glare of his eyes just makes you even angrier.

_"Trust me, this wasn't my choice. I would love to just let you go on living your life. But something decided that you get my memories, so here I am."_ Signless glances around the room, taking in your pile, and the stack of book you'd collected out of Harley's ancestor's things, and the husktop whirring away in the corner.

"Well _go away._ " you growl, clenching your fists in the comfort square, "Don't you think you've already done quite enough?"

Signless shrugs. _"I would if I could, but I don't think I'm even really here."_

"So what," you scoff, "you are a product of my own mind, unable to handle the influx of a mere extra twelve sweeps of memories? After spending millennia inside the dream bubbles? I highly doubt _that._ "

_"I doubt it too."_ Signless agrees with a crooked smile, _"No. I'm just... an echo. Those memories you’ve got of mine? I'm the representation of them. I doubt I'll be around for too long once you start integrating them. Though... I might disappear if you repress 'em, too. I'm not sure."_

You frown, staring at the ghost of your alternate self. "That makes no sense at all. None of the others have mentioned manifestations."

_"No,"_ Signless nods, then shrugs, _"but we're Blood. Things are different for us. I'm sure your little teal friend, what's her name, Latula?"_

You nod, shoving the urge to tell him that she's not your friend into the back of your mind.

_"I'm sure Latula had something similar happen. She's Mind, after all, and from what I've seen of your memories, she's stubborn as hell. She'd probably force a confrontation before she started allowing her alt-self to integrate."_

"You've seen my memories?!" You demand, your voice raised into a half shriek, and Signless winces.

_"I'm literally in your head. My memories are your memories, and once you start integrating them, I will literally become you. It's a little hard_ not _to have seen them."_

You curl in on yourself, flushed with shame, and for a moment your respite block is silent.

_"I'm sorry."_ Signless finally offers. _"This isn't the way I would have done things, if I'd had a choice."_

"I know." you say, your voice muffled by the comfort square you'd hiding your face in.

And it's true. You do know. Every single memory you'd seen had shown you that above all else, Signless held the ability to _choose,_ sacred. He would talk, and try to convince, and offer other points of view, but when it came down to it, he would never _force_ someone to do something.

Looking at it from the outside, you could see why he was so well loved.

"So what do we do?" You ask, looking up at your alternate self.

Signless' face gets serious, and he settles himself on the ground, sitting cross-legged in front of you, a few feet away.

_"There's a couple of ways this works out."_ he says seriously, _"The first is that our memories stay jumbled together. You won't be able to tell if you're remembering something from when_ you _were six, or when_ I _was six, unless someone tells you otherwise. Both sets of memories will be intact, and it'll be like you lived on Beforus and Alternia at the same time. It'll be confusing, and hard, and frustrating, but you might be able to better understand where my descendant and his group are coming from."_

You frown at that. That sounds _horrible._ Not being able to tell? Not being able to keep things straight? And he's older than you are, so how would that even work? Would your new memories get jumbled up even as you're making them?

"What other options are there?" You ask, and Signless nods.

_"You could completely reject the memories. Lock them in a box, shove them into the back of your mind and pretend they don't exist. You'll have nightmares, and they'll show up in dreams, and maybe sometimes someone will say something, or you'll see something that'll remind you, and a memory will escape and you'll be trapped in it until it plays out and you can shove it back in the box. On the plus side, it means you won't have to change who you are. You can still be the Kankri Vantas you've always been. For a while."_

He's watching you, his face even as he lays out the pros and cons of you pretending he'd never existed, and for a brief, split second, you hate him.

_"A third option,"_ he continues easily after a brief pause, _"is the opposite of the second. You lock_ your _memories away, and become me. I will dream your life, and your memories, and occasionally there would be sights, or sounds, or scents that would trigger flashbacks into your life."_

You can feel the blood draining out of your face as he tells you the third option, and you're shaking your head before he can even stop speaking. "No. Not that. Please, not that."

Signless inclines his head gravely, his eyes serious. _"I would not. Not unless that was your choice. I am simply telling you what you_ can _choose. There is one more option."_ he says, and hesitates. _"This one is more... This option will have the largest change, to both of us, but might just be the most beneficial. It is similar to what happens to the others, who do not have the choice, but different in that we could choose how to go about it. It's a sort of blending. Not like with the first option, where you would very likely go mad before a sweep is out, but similar."_

_We would, the two of us together, go through each and every single memory we have, and sort them. Some memories would fade, until it was as though we had read them in a book, or watched them in a movie. Other memories would remain clear, as though we had truly lived them. We would pick through our personalities, choosing what remains, and what fades. We would go through our abilities, and do the same. At the end, there would be Kankri, because we_ are _both Kankri, but it would be a different Kankri than either of us alone."_

You frown. "Is that why Mituna is so much more aggressive?" you ask, "I had thought it was simply a side effect from his thinksponge damage being healed."

_"Alternia was a much more violent place than Beforus. Mituna was always particularly zealous in making sure that he was a good enough fighter to keep us safe. In fact, he trained many of the psionics during our rebellion."_

Signless' fond smile makes your eyes narrow, but you try to ignore it, thinking hard about the options he's given you.

It's obvious which choice he _wants_ you to make, and you're halfway tempted to choose differently, just to spite the older troll, but you stifle the urge and try to look at it all objectively.

You don't particularly want to go insane. All that would do is invite culling, of either variety, from the other trolls. You still aren't sure how the humans would react, and you're not in any mood to find out. However, you don't want to not be you, either. You worked so _hard_ to be yourself. To keep yourself from being culled for being a mutant, when you _know_ that you're perfectly capable to handling yourself.

To go insane, just because you refuse to even look at or think about the actions of another you? That would be... no. You can't choose that.

You refuse to even consider allowing Signless to supplant you, too. This is _your_ body. It is _your_ mind, and you'll be damned if someone is going to take that from you.

You _could_ just lock it all away. The nightmares couldn't be _that_ bad... but the thought makes you hesitate, and you look at Signless again.

Even though he's done his best to shroud his body in the daycloak, and even though his face is untouched, you can still catch glimpses of bright crimson. Of dark skin marred by darker bruises. And you can't get the brief glimpse of charred flesh and bone out of your mind.

The dreams you'd had last night had been, for the most part, horrible. You'd never wanted to know what it was like to feel such unending agony, and you never wanted to feel it again.

If locking him away made nightmares more likely, then...

"How do we start?" you ask, looking Signless dead in the eyes, "I want to do the fourth thing. Blending with you so that we're better. So that _I'm_ better."

Signless' smile is bittersweet, and his eyes are knowing as he extends his hand to you.

You can't look at it, your gorge rising.

_"Let me show you."_ he says, and his fingers around your wrists are a barely there phantom sensation as he drags you down into darkness.

 

It occurs to you, several hours later in the mental projection that you were sharing with Signless, that this was going to take significantly longer than you'd originally thought.

"Of course it is," Signless says, surprised, when you confront him about it, "we are going to be living our lives again, after all. And even if it is in your mind, and can be done faster, it's still going to take time. What, did you think we'd just whip through it, toss things every which way and be done with it?"

You scowl at him, and look away. You _had_ thought it would be something like that, but instead the two of you are working slowly and methodically through every single memory you have. From the first, hazy scent memories of grubhood, to the painful brightness of your first after-pupation sight, Signless is leaving no memory alone, and the two of you have to discuss every single one, deciding what will be kept, and what will fade.

You'd thought it would be easy. Of course Signless' memories should fade. They were horrible memories, of a horrible place. Why would anyone want to remember those?

Except... you kept stumbling across memories that show that that isn't the case.

Memories of campfires and old tales, told in the soothing voice of the one member of the species he could always trust. Of songs sung in a language you didn't know, but that resonated with you anyway. Of warm kisses from Meulin, and affectionate hugs from Mituna.

Of kindnesses, large and small from trolls he'd never met, but who had heard of him. Of finding the sickles, left out in a field with a small bag of supplies nearby and a note that simply read 'for those in need of a Sign.'

The Alternia that Signless knows and loves wasn't a horrible place all the time, and as you live through the memories with him, you come to find it harder and harder to set those memories aside.

You've been keeping an eye on Signless, too. Watching him as he lives through your memories, and finds things not as idyllic as he'd thought.

Granted, Beforus is far and away better than Alternia in many ways, but the casual, cutting cruelty hiding beneath the friendly, kind exteriors of your fellow Beforan, (and your own, you can at least admit that much) seems to be exactly the reverse of many of the members of Alternia's population.

In many ways, you're being forced to admit, neither world is better than the other; just different in how the cruelty is displayed.

But the two of you work through it, living the memories, and placing those that can afford to be forgotten aside.

You take a break when you get to the end of his life, opening your eyes to the pitch darkness of your respite block and standing with a groan before stretching as best you can. It takes you a moment to fumble your way over to the door, and when you pull it open you're left hissing as the hallway light assaults your eyes.

The two of you still have to live through your time in the dream bubbles, and while you're curious as to how the memory remnant of Signless with take your conversation with the Signless you'd found in the dream bubbles, you also sort of don't want to know. You'd like to be able to stuff all of the memories of the dream bubbles into the 'to be forgotten' pile, but you know he won't let you. Know that it's for the best that you go about this as carefully as you can.

It's tiring though, and you're hungry, so you venture down to the food preparation block.

When you get there, the light inside is on, and you sigh. You really hadn't wanted to deal with anyone else just yet. Not until you'd finished getting the inside of your head sorted out, but your stomach is making its demands in increasingly strident tones, so you brace yourself, push open the door, and step inside.

The food prep block is warm, and full of the smell of good (familiar) food, and you barely register the hum of conversation cutting off as you head directly to the thermal hull and pull the door open.

It's full of food, as usual; a mix of plant and animal matter, none of which is familiar to you. Some of it is obviously a sort of derivative of the normal Beforan cuisine, but it's just off enough for you to taste the difference, and it's been driving you to distraction.

_"They're talking to you."_ Signless' soft voice breaks you out of your thermal hull contemplation, and you glare at him as you turn around to face the table.

You hadn't realized he'd still be able to manifest once you'd started integrating his memories, which might _possibly_ account for the ice in your voice as you look at the occupants of the table.

"What?" you ask, and Porrim raises her double pierced eyebrow at you as Karkat shoves a plate in your direction.

"Jade went to the mainland earlier tonight. Apparently some of what we were saying finally sank though the layer of fur surrounding her thinksponge, because she brought us back some _real_ food."

You let the thermal hull's door shut, staring with wide eyes at the contents of the plate.

"Everyone else has already had their share." Porrim informs you, "I was just debating whether to take yours up to you or not, since Mituna said that you wanted to be alone."

"I did. Do. Um..." you tear your attention away from the plateful of pale brown, gorgeous looking grubs and look between Porrim and Karkat. " _Thank you._ "

You make the words as heartfelt as you can, ignoring Karkat's uncomfortable scoff as you grab a fork from the clean dish receptacle at the side of the sink, throw yourself into a chair, and start eating.

The first bite tastes like what you imagine the 'heaven' some of the human ghosts talked about would be like. The second bite is better, and you can't contain your hum of contentment as the fatty juices explode into your mouth.

"These have to be the best things I've ever eaten." You mumble around a mouthful, and shoot Signless, then Porrim, a glare as they start to snicker.

Karkat just rolls his eyes. "Don't talk with your mouth full, idiot. You'll fucking choke, and then we'll have to get Feferi or Meenah down here to resuscitate your dumb ass."

You wave him off with your fork, too full of goodwill brought on by decent food to take him to task for his insensitive language, and he rolls his eyes again before stalking out of the block.

You manage another couple of bites before Porrim leans forward, frowning slightly as her eyes search your face.

"Are you all right, Kankri?"

"I'm fine. In fact, I'm more than fine, and as soon as I'm done with this marvelous example of real food, (which, remind me to commend Harley on her interspecies sensitivity) I'm going to go back to my respite block and continue to be fine there."

Her eyes narrow, and Signless chuckles at you from behind her, his arms crossed as he regards her fondly.

"Are you sure?" Porrim presses, and you glare at her.

"Positive." You say crisply, and shove another bite of grubs into your mouth.

"Kankri." Porrim starts, her tone long suffering, "I know you Dreamed last night, and I-"

You cut her off, "Yes. I dreamed last night. Yes, I remember being Signless. No, I do not want to talk about it, and the fact that you are continuing to question me on this matter is highly disrespectful, not to mention potentially triggering, _as you well know._ So yes, I am fine. And now, I am going to take my food to my respite block, finish it there, and _continue to be fine._ "

You shove the chair back, grab the plate from the table, snatch the fork from midair as it somersaults off the plate with the force of your grab, and stalk toward the door.

For a moment, you hesitate, torn between your righteous indignation and good manners.

Manners wins out, and you mutter a quick thanks for saving the grubs for you, then make your escape back to your respite block.

_"That was rude."_ Signless says matter-of-factly, his voice completely devoid of reproach.

"I don't need her attempts to _cull_ me." You hiss, bristling at the manifestation of your alternate self, who arches an eyebrow at you.

_"That didn't look like culling."_ he says, _"Alternian or Beforan. It looked like what Dolorosa did for me. Caring. Making sure someone she cared about was all right. Seeing if there was anything she could do to fix whatever's wrong."_

He paused for a moment, then shrugged, _"Granted, it didn't always work out well, but she did_ try _."_

You choose to ignore that, instead kicking your door shut behind you and settling back on your pile to shovel the bits of roasted goodness into your mouth.

"How are you even still able to manifest?" You ask, and ignore his disapproving look at your full mouth, too. "I thought once we started to integrate, I would no longer be able to see you."

Signless shrugs. _"We haven't finished. Right now all we've done is sort my life, and part of yours. Once we've finished the whole process you'll probably fall asleep for a bit while everything reconfigures in your head. After that, I won't exist, and neither will you. We'll be a new person that happens to be very similar to both of us."_

He pauses for a moment, looking thoughtful, _"I suppose it helps that we're actually more similar than either of us thought we were. It'll make the resultant person much closer to the originals."_

You hide a shudder at that thought, and Signless smiled mirthlessly.

_"You need to stop worrying so much. I'm not going to supplant you. When I say there will be a new person, I mean it in the same way that you are not the same person you were before you played Sgrub. Experiences change people. That's all."_

You shove the last forkful of grubs into your mouth so you don't have to respond to that, and he smirks knowingly at you.

"Let's just finish this." you say resignedly, setting the plate aside and reaching for Signless' hand.

_"If you insist._ " He says, and for a moment, all you see is darkness before you are, once again, in the mental library you'd started in.

 

It takes you the rest of the night, and well into the next day to go through your time in the dream bubbles, and living it again makes you want to cringe. You hadn't realized it at the time, but now that you're alive again you want to scream at how ridiculous it all was. There was so much _time_ , so many opportunities to _change_ , and yet, you hadn't at all! Oh, sure, you'd learned a couple of skills, and you'd perfected arguments, and you'd watched the others fall into and out of relationships, but you hadn't actually grown as a _person._ It was _maddening_.

"It makes sense, actually." Signless said from the armchair he'd imagined into being in the mindscape the two of you were sharing for this. "In the dream bubbles, anything you thought of could happen, right? And the more people were thinking of one thing, the more likely it would be for that to happen? Well, what happens if everyone sees one part of a person, and knows that that's who they are?"

"It... doesn't allow room for change." You say slowly, realization dawning, and Signless nods.

"Small changes, like a new skill, or a new lover, yes. Big changes, like personal growth that would lead in a direction contrary to the way _everyone knows you are_? Not so much. I suspect much of the personality clashes that happened in the dream bubbles were a result of such stereotyping."

"That makes _so much sense._ " You breathe, and are, abruptly, horrified. How many of your interpersonal interactions were dictated by the way you _thought_ someone was going to react? This is _terrible!_

You groan, and bury your face in your hands. "I am going to owe so many people apologies..." you mutter, and Signless, the asshole, just laughs at you.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's loads of other snippets and progress updates over on my tumblr. If you feel like giving me prompts because you want to see something happen in the Aftermath universe, then hit me up over there. It really helps me out!  
> kalicofox.tumblr.com


	5. Cronus; Dream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The second instalment in the Beforans dreaming their alt selves. I'm uploading them in the order that they dream, so Mituna is first, and Cronus is second.

_It starts in the sea._

_It always starts in the sea; it is home and flushmate and pitch partner, all in one._

_You love the sea as you love little else, and it is the sea who guides you to Her._

_To both of them, in fact._

_The Empress, with her slow anger that breaks into raging fury._

_The Gamblignant, with her sly smiles and casual cruelty._

_You pity one, and loathe the other, and in between there is always the sea._

_The water is in them, too, pushing and pulling them thither and yon. You understand it._

_The sea pulls at you, too._

_Or maybe it is your duty that pulls at you._

_You are the Orphaner. She trusts you as She trusts few others, and your title reflects that. Others may have something similar, but you are the only true Orphaner, and you wear the title with pride._

_Thousands of lusii fall to your Crosshairs, and though you might not deliver them to the imperial lusus yourself, you know that the Empress must feel some sort of gratitude to you._

_It is due to your diligence that the troll race continues, after all._

_You have little to do with whatever troubles the land. You do not care to have anything to do with it._

_It has been centuries since you felt any pale leanings, so when you lay eyes on the jade, an imperial gift of a slave from the crushed rebellion, and feel a faint stirring of pity, you barely recognize it._

_You wish to wipe the broken look out of her eyes. You want to see what a smile looks like on those black lips._

_But you have no time for a slave, and less time than that for a member of a failed rebellion. You have your duty, and your kismesis to tend to. And your kismesis is a demanding one._

_Any pale feelings are erased by Mindfang's manipulation, and the slow, smoldering antipathy you feel for Mindfang herself flares into life as a deep, raging hatred that nothing save her death will ease._

_But you cannot do it yourself. And move you would make against her would either be averted, or turned back on yourself by her manipulations.  Instead, you soothe the first burn of your ire by assassinating the slave. Let Mindfang feel the sting of denial for once._

_You have subjugglators to coerce to your side._

You jerk awake with a shriek, and your fingers are in your hair before you can even register that you've moved.

Your horns are whole. Your skull isn't caved in. There are no Subjugglators in your respite block, but you can't stop shaking, clutching at the roots of your horns.

There was so much death, and so much terror, and he felt everything so _strongly_. It's alien to you. You don't understand how someone can feel so strongly and not fly apart at the seams.

 

 

It takes you a while to pull yourself together, but you can't fall back asleep. Your skin is crawling, and laying in your pile is doing the exact opposite of helping.

Growling softly, you roll to your feet and stalk out of your respite block. You'd fucking _kill_ for some sopor right now; nice soothing slime, with just enough sedatives in it to knock you back out for the rest of the day.

You're letting your feet guide you, not really thinking about where you're going until you realize that you're reaching out to open the front door and pause.

Sure, Earth's sunlight doesn't hurt as bad as Alternia's. Or Beforus', you remind yourself, but it's bright as hell outside even when it's overcast, and you don't particularly feel like dealing with your eyes watering for a good few hours after you come back in where it's sensibly dimly lit.

Your skin is itching. It's crawling. It's too dry up here, and you can't hear the waves.

"Cronus?" The voice behind you is cautious, and you're snarling at it before you even think, ear fins flared.

"Woah, calm down there, Rambo." D's wings are mantled, like he's about to head for the ceiling the second he thinks you're going to make a move at him, and you force yourself to calm down. To relax. You gotta be chill.

"Hey chief." You say as casually as you can, and go to shove your hands into your pockets only to realize that you'd completely forgotten to put on any clothes at all.

The hints of red you can see on D's cheeks under his shades say that he's noticed too.

It's still chill. You got this. Just... play it off.

 "So..." D drawls awkwardly, and you nod.

"Yep."

"Please tell me this isn't a weird troll thing." D says, deadpan, and you snicker.

"Nah, chief. I just felt like a swim."

D nods slowly, and  doesn't mention the fact that it's the middle of the day.

For a moment he just looks at you contemplatively, and you half wish he wasn't wearing those damn shades, if only so you could see where he was looking. Still, his blush is starting to fade, so it's probably not directly at you.

"Want a lift?" He finally asks, and you boggle at him.

"What?"

"Do you want me to fly you out to the water?" D repeats patiently, "C'mon dude, keep up. It'll be faster than trying to hike out through the forest."

Your mood lifts considerably at that. "That'd be great! Thanks, man!"

You grin at him, wide and pleased, and D shifts uncomfortably.

"Just... one thing," he says a little plaintively, "d'you think you could put on some fucking pants?"

You glance down, then back up at him and your grin widens as you waggle your eyebrows at him.

"Sure thing, Chief."

"Ampora," D calls after you, "I swear to god if you show back up in a speedo I'm gonna drop you in the fucking forest!"

You just wave him off, making a mental note to look up what a 'speedo' is, later.

 

D's waiting for you when you get back to the entry way, his wings twitching restlessly, and he nods when he sees you.

You hadn't actually put on pants. They'd just get heavy and be a pain in the ass once you're in the water. But you had found a pair of loose shorts, so you'd donned those and figured if they got to be too much trouble you could just strip 'em off.

"Right." D says, one hand on the doorknob. "I'm not carrying your ass bridal style. That's a bit too messed up. So once you're ready for me to pick you up, hold your arms up over your head, got it?"

You aren't sure what he's planning, but you nod, and follow him out the door.

He seems to relax a little once he's outside, but you're squinting against the blinding glare of the sun, and can't really see all that well, so it could just be your imagination.

Dust flies as his wings spread, then flap once, twice, and then he leaps into the air, his orangey red wings hammering at the air to get him height. You wait until he's started circling, his wings wide open and flapping every few seconds, then you take a deep breath and hold your arms up over your head, watching D to see what he's planning on doing.

He circles around overhead once, then heads out a little further over the edge of the cliff and sweeps back towards you, angling low.

Warm fingers grab your wrists just as he passes overhead, and you automatically grab back, grabbing his wrists back and running to maintain his momentum (and so you don't end up on your face).

With a thrill of terror you realize that your feet are still touching the ground with every step, and that you're headed right for the edge of the cliff.

"D?" You shout, and the fingers around your wrists tighten as you take three more running steps and fling yourself, screaming, out over the edge.

Gold wings _slam_ downwards, the feathers at the tips almost touching your feet at their lowest point, and the two of you lurch upwards.

It's terrifying, and awe-inspiring, and you feel like you left your stomach back on the clifftop, but you can't help whooping with joy as you watch the forest pass underneath your feet.

After a couple of moments, D's wings aren't beating so frantically, and you can sort of feel the way the wind is catching and pulling at the two of you, bearing you up, then letting you drop, almost like a purrbeast playing with a squeakbeast.

"I'll take you out to the bay," D shouts over the wind, "It'll be easier than heading toward the open water. Get ready to let go once I get low enough."

You nod, then realize he probably didn't see you and shout back an affirmative.

D turns his long, slow strokes of the air into a glide, angling just _slightly_ downward toward the frog temple and letting gravity do most of the work for him. It's weird as _hell_ , being in the air without anything more than some skinny human keeping you up, but at the same time it's amazing. It makes you wish you had wings of your own even more than Rufioh's constant flaunting of _his_ wings do.

You end up out over the water a lot faster than you'd thought possible, and D manages to get you so low that your toes are almost skimming the water.

"Thanks for the lift, chief!" you call up to him, and almost at the same time, the two of you let go of each other.

The water is _warm_ , and for a moment you luxuriate in the fresh, clean feel of the saltwater, then you kick once, twice, and your head breaks the surface. D's circling the frog temple, and you wave at him, partly to let him know you're all right and partly in thanks, then slip back under the waves.

 

Being out in the water brings a slew of memories rushing back; memories of hunting aquatic lusii, of the aching burn of polluted water through your gills, of daring, just the once, to swim close enough to Gl'bgolyb to see it.

You shake your head, and kick off the sandy bottom of the bay. It's still too bright here, and it's making your eyes hurt.

Swimming in Earth's ocean is as different from swimming in Alternia's as you could get. It's warm, and there's colorful coral and fish everywhere, and best of all, the water filtering through your gills doesn't burn. The salt is soothing, and although there's a faint hint of chemicals that you can't identify, it's no where near as bad as the near corrosive _ache_ of pollution.

It reminds you of Beforus, almost, though it's still too bright, and just a little too colorful. It's still enough to spark a pang of the homesickness that you thought you'd gotten over eons ago in the dream bubbles.

It's easy enough to leave the bay if you swim low, down near the bottom where the currents aren't strong enough to pull a violetblood off course, and you almost sigh with relief when the bottom drops away quickly, leading you down into murky darkness.

Down here, it feels even more homelike, even though you hadn't spent much time in the water on Beforus. It's dark, with dim light filtering through dozens of feet of water, and without the coral to hide in, there aren't many fish. It's just bare sand, with a few protruding rocks, and the gentle, almost imperceptible sway of the sea.

You catch yourself yawning, the familiar-not-familiar movement lulling you closer and closer to sleep, and scowl. You can't fall asleep out here, with nothing to anchor you, or you'll probably wake up in some trench somewhere, without any landmarks to guide you back to land.

You haven't even learned the stars here, (though why you'd have thought of that before, you don't know.) You'll have to find a cave or something to crash in, 'cause you didn't get all the way down here just to turn around and go back to the hive.

 

It takes you a couple of hours of searching, your yawns growing more and more frequent as time passed, but eventually you found a decent sized cave, well under water, and with no tide marks inside. Even better, it had another opening in one side, smaller than the one you'd come in through, but enough to let water pass through so you wouldn't run the risk of suffocating in your sleep. It takes you another half an hour to harvest some of the sea grass growing about half a mile out from your cave, and when you're finished you can barely keep your eyes open, but you've got yourself a decent amount of it to weave into a rope that'll keep you anchored in your cave.

The finished rope isn't much to look at, and part of you is embarrased that you even made it, but it holds well around your ankle, and when you tug on it it doesn't come apart, so you pile a few heavy rocks on top of the other end, and finally, _finally,_ let the sea lull you back to sleep.

 


End file.
